First Milk UK chooses IFS applications

First Milk has chosen IFS Applications to help streamline its supply chain IFS, the global enterprise applications.

Britain's largest UK- farmer-owned business First Milk, has selected IFS Applications to provide full integration of all critical business processes and optimise production across its cheese division sites nationwide. In a deal worth US$3 million, IFS Applications will be deployed in the eight creameries and packing plants over nine months.

IFS has its largest R and D centre in Sri Lanka with over 600 staff. As for the IFS Applications which is on its seventh generation (IFS Application 7), more than 70% of the product development is been done in Sri Lanka.

IFS Applications will integrate First Milk's formerly disjointed business systems and processes, including warehouse management, financials, forecasting and payroll, enabling centralised control of operations and providing a new level of visibility across the entire enterprise and supply chain.

According to First Milk's Group Head of IT Alan Hutchison, IFS was chosen over other world leading ERP providers because its solution delivers seamless integration, is easy to use and quick to implement, and demonstrated unmatched functionality during the selection process.

"The central challenge of cheese production is accurately forecasting demand 18 months out from actual delivery to customers, matching this with supply from farmers, and keeping track of the different maturation levels of thousands of tonnes of cheese.

The ability of IFS Applications to handle the company's long-term and short-term production planning requirements within one system was a key reason behind our decision to implement it," said Hutchison.

Commenting on plans for the future, Hutchison said, "The plan is to roll out IFS Applications across our milk operations and ingredients divisions as well."

Commenting on the First Milk UK deal, Sales and Marketing Manager South Asia, Shiraz Lye says that the same solution now could be implemented in similar companies in the region.

"Having a tested and time proven solution is very easy and fast to implement, and easy to use as most of the issue areas are been addressed and corrected.

"IFS Sri Lanka markets its products in the South Asia region covering Pakistan, Bangladesh and India, and our presence here has made us very noticeable and has had the benefit during the selection process".

IFS Applications for the food and beverage industry provides support for all critical business processes, including batch balancing, recipe management, quality management, and demand planning supporting domain specific needs like multiple units of measure and catch weight.

First Milk is the largest dairy farmer co-operative in the UK. Its members' farms stretch from Central Scotland to the South of England and from West Wales to East Anglia. The business has three divisions: Milk Operations; Cheese; and Ingredients.

First Milk Cheese Company is the largest UK-based cheese supplier. IFS (OMX: IFS), the global enterprise applications company, provides solutions which enable organizations to respond quickly to market changes - allowing resources to be used in a more agile way to achieve better business performance and competitive advantage.

IFS was founded in 1983 and now has 2,600 employees worldwide. IFS Applications is available in 54 countries in 22 languages.